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For $44 billion, Microsoft could buy every Silicon Valley and Silicon Alley venture-backed start-up in existence. That includes Facebook at $15 billion. It incl

by dfranke 19y ago

For $44 billion, Microsoft could buy every Silicon Valley and Silicon Alley venture-backed start-up in existence. That includes Facebook at $15 billion. It includes Slide, RockYou, and every other elemental company. It would be a Moe Green kind of scene like at the end of the Godfather when Michael Corleone takes out all the heads of the five families. It would turn Microsoft's Internet business around overnight. It would be the ultimate coup. That is indeed the scariest thing that I have read this year.

gruseom 19y ago
Really? I think it would create new forms of opportunity.
mechanical_fish 19y ago
Sure, they could buy every startup in existence. But could they hold them? If you buy a startup and then put it on a shelf, the employees quit and use the money you gave them to make another startup, or retire to Barbados. You have to keep them busy, and interested, and to do that you have to challenge them, flatter them, help them to grow. Who has the time to do that with all the companies in the Valley at once? The flip side of this paradox is: Steve Ballmer controls billions of dollars, but he can't buy time. There's only one Steve Ballmer, and he can only make so many decisions in a year, no matter how much he spends. Frankly, I think giving Microsoft the gift of every startup in the Valley might be a very effective way to kill the company. They wouldn't have any idea what to do with them all. The flood of brilliant new employees would overwhelm the existing corporate culture. Everyone would spend five years sitting in cubicles, editing .emacs files, upmodding posts on news.yc, going to the occasional meeting to talk to the shell-shocked managers who are desperately trying to bolt everything together into some kind of strategy, and waiting for vesting day -- when they will all leave and start another bunch of tiny companies. In other words, it would be like Microsoft probably is now, only more so.
giardini 19y ago
But Microsoft has been declared by the courts to be a monopoly that has abused it's market position. Every acquisition must be considered in that light. So they won't be buying up Silicon Valley anytime soon. (and certainly not with a Democratic administration coming to power). OTOH they could diversify: buy up biotech & nanotechnology firms, etc. and put part of the $44 billion into VC investment.

by dfranke 19y ago

gruseom 19y ago

Really? I think it would create new forms of opportunity.

mechanical_fish 19y ago

Sure, they could buy every startup in existence. But could they hold them? If you buy a startup and then put it on a shelf, the employees quit and use the money you gave them to make another startup, or retire to Barbados. You have to keep them busy, and interested, and to do that you have to challenge them, flatter them, help them to grow. Who has the time to do that with all the companies in the Valley at once? The flip side of this paradox is: Steve Ballmer controls billions of dollars, but he can't buy time. There's only one Steve Ballmer, and he can only make so many decisions in a year, no matter how much he spends. Frankly, I think giving Microsoft the gift of every startup in the Valley might be a very effective way to kill the company. They wouldn't have any idea what to do with them all. The flood of brilliant new employees would overwhelm the existing corporate culture. Everyone would spend five years sitting in cubicles, editing .emacs files, upmodding posts on news.yc, going to the occasional meeting to talk to the shell-shocked managers who are desperately trying to bolt everything together into some kind of strategy, and waiting for vesting day -- when they will all leave and start another bunch of tiny companies. In other words, it would be like Microsoft probably is now, only more so.

giardini 19y ago

But Microsoft has been declared by the courts to be a monopoly that has abused it's market position. Every acquisition must be considered in that light. So they won't be buying up Silicon Valley anytime soon. (and certainly not with a Democratic administration coming to power). OTOH they could diversify: buy up biotech & nanotechnology firms, etc. and put part of the $44 billion into VC investment.